NWR: Church hopping

Ambybambi1125

I've been meaning to post about this here but have not gotten around to it until today. A few weeks back I was at a woman's Lenten retreat and ran into a nun in the restroom and she was discussing with another woman middle aged and me 20something while we were waiting to use the restroom the problem of church "hopping" by young people.


The other woman said it is a big issue for parishes because it makes it difficult to plan on how many people will be in attendanceplan for what I do not knowthe Eucharist?...but the nun stated that shed rather have young people attending SOMEWHERE even if they were church hopping, although not the ideal.


I know that my fianc and I try to go to church at our home parish but there are times where we will go to another parish with friends for mass or go to another parish we enjoy just to change it up. My question for you ladies is do you see this as an issue? Do you church hop?

Calypso1977

sometimes initially you have to church hop, say, when you move to a new area because it's important to find a parish that fits you. sadly, a good/bad priest can make or break a parish. however once you find a parish to me it makes sense to always go there except when you go somewhere else because you're traveling. for example I attend my mother's church when I visit her and she is atends mine when she visits here.

professorscience

We did a little when we lived in Dallas, just to find a parish home, as Calypso said.  Once we settled on a church, we rarely ever changed.

When we moved to Oklahoma we looked around a LITTLE, but we were fortunate enough to feel at home at the local parish, so we didn't have to move around too much.  Once or twice I've gone to the parish that is close to my school, because it sometimes has more convenient mass times on holy days.

There's definitely something to be said for the lack of fellowship in a parish if the people in attendance are only there sporadically.

Riss91

You should have a primary parish, that you attend most of the time. But I don't think it is wrong to have alternate parishes that you attend in odd circumstances. I think the larger problem is when you attend a church very regularly, but aren't signed up.

Our "home" parish that we belong to is about 30 min away. It isn't the parish closest to us, but it is the parish we love and feel most comfortable in. On occasion, due to scheduling problems, we attend another parish in the area. If we miss mass at our "home" parish, we always send in our envelope in addition to contributing to the basket at the parish we did attend. This way, we feel we aren't negatively impacting our parish if we cannot make it to mass there.

newlyseliski

My husband and I have done more church hopping than not... primarily because we haven't been firmly rooted and established anywhere yet.  We're technically parishioners at the parish we were married at where I joined immediately after graduating college.  Since that point, I moved around the metro area a bunch and ultimately ended up 40 minutes away from that parish.  We usually attend a parish about 5 minutes away and have participated in bible studies and whatnot there.  Also, we assist with confirmation classes at another different parish nearby.  

Ultimately, it's difficult to remain rooted in a parish community if you are still in a transient stage of your life... which I think many older adults who may have lived in the same place and attended the same parish for, say, 20+ years don't quite get!  The pre-house and pre-kid years are inherently chaotic in their own way :-) 

Tami87

Well in the 4 years H and I have been living in the DC area we have moved 7 times between the two of us. Also for most of that time we lived about an hour away from eachother so we liked to alternate who traveled each weekend since if possible we like to attend mass together. Needless to say we have attended about 8 different parishes. When I asked the priest at the student center on the campus I am a grad student about marriage prep I think he thought we were being a little riddiculous and tried to convince us to pick one church and become part of the community there. Now that we are married we have registered for our neighborhood parish and H started teaching SOR. It is nice to have a home parish, but it is also kind of cool that we now know so many different priests in the DC area.

shawna127

I'm very guilty of church hopping!  We have a Cathedral in our town and I love to go there and usually go by myself.  But when I go with my mother I go to a smaller church in town.  So it really depends on whether I'm going by myself or with my mother

[Deleted User]

I guess you could say we church hop. If we are super tired and need a little extra sleep on Sunday's we will go to the church that is about 20 minutes away instead of 5 with a later mass. I do love our church but our priest is a little more liberal than I prefer. Also, we feel our church is sort of stagnant since there are a lot of older families that have been in the parish forever. Also, our priest has many health problems and H and I don't feel he does as much as he could. Our parish does have a school and I know how involved and time consuming that can be. Its just that we feel that sometimes his health is a factor in the job that he is doing if that makes sense.

H and I are going to have a big decision to make b/c while we like the priest at the other church, having our baby baptized in our church will mean a lot to us since it is where our relationship came together and where we were married.

[Deleted User]

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/cultural-wedding-boards_catholic-weddings_nwr-church-hopping?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Cultural Wedding BoardsForum:615Discussion:43f39182-c047-4ab3-99c7-b5eecb989fafPost:ae294cbb-6579-4701-a922-59d2e2c7c2f3">Re: NWR: Church hopping</a>:
[QUOTE]In Response to Re: NWR: Church hopping : Do you feel comfortable asking that priest to baptize your baby at the other church?
Posted by TXKristan[/QUOTE]

This is something that we are tossing around right now. I really hope to have our newly ordained deacon family friend present at the baptismal as well. We also just started helping out with the youth group at the church we attend most of the time since it is struggling quite a bit. The other church we attend has a pretty strong youth group and leader.

Ciardasully

I church hopped for awhile until DH (then boyfriend) and I found the perfect parish that we ended up getting married in.  We just needed the right fit.  We almost always attend our home church but once in awhile if I have to work, I will attend another local church because our local parish does Holy Day Masses before I get out of work.